


they made you into a weapon and asked you to find peace

by imalwaysstraight



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Depression, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Marauders' Era, Suicide, Suicide Attempt, q-slur, the fifth-year prank, wolfstar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-25
Updated: 2015-07-25
Packaged: 2018-04-11 05:15:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4422788
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imalwaysstraight/pseuds/imalwaysstraight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sirius holds his wand up to his head.<br/>--<br/>In the aftermath of almost outing Remus as a wolf, and struggling with growing up on the brink of war, Sirius takes things into his own hands. Remus arrives just in time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	they made you into a weapon and asked you to find peace

“Where’s Sirius?” James raises his brow and Peter stops chewing. This is the first time that name has come off Remus’s lips in just over a week, no small occasion, and it’s even more remarkable because neither of the other two has dared to ask the question aloud yet, for fear of invoking a moody werewolf’s sulking. But, lo and behold, here is said moody werewolf, asking it himself. Remus picks up another bite of pudding and shoves it in his mouth before finally acknowledging the silence. “What?”

Unfreezing, James clears his throat. “I, ah, don’t know where he is.”

Remus swallows and shovels another spoonful into his mouth much too fast, chewing vigorously. He knew this- doing this, breaching the wall- would be awkward, and he just wants it to be over. There’s a lot of things he wants to be over. Poets who write of time slipping through their fingers are just nostalgic gits, he thinks, because for every moment which flees from the present like a fox from a dog, there are another thousand in which time runs far too slow.

“D’you think,” the curly-haired boy says slowly, mouth full and expression terrifyingly blank, “That maybe we ought to?” It sends chills down the spines of both of his friends.

Angry Remus, it is generally agreed upon by the other Marauders, is _the_ most frightening person you may ever encounter, only surpassed by one soaking wet Argus Filch who’s just had to wrestle you and your wasted best friend out of the giant squid’s grip at three in the morning. (They don’t speak of that truth or dare game unless they’re all drunker than when it happened.) Yes, that scary. It’s not because of the wolf, his violence and his, well, ‘anger issues’, if you can call them that. It’s precisely the opposite: it’s because Remus does not get angry. He does not get angry, until he does, and then it’s the worst grinding feeling in the pit of your gut because infuriated Remus is all calm but cold and hard looks and passive aggressiveness and gruff shortness, no yelling, and you just want him to _snap_ and get it over with, to lose control, to maul you emotionally- but no, no, he just drags it out and it hurts even more. ( _Does he know that?_ James wonders. _Is that why he does it?_ ) It’s the worst feeling because Remus Lupin does not get angry, and so you must’ve really fucked up to earn that hard-set jaw and blank look. You must’ve fucked up big-time.

“He wasn’t in potions,” Peter says quietly, staring at his plate. “Or charms.”

“Well,” Remus starts, standing up. He has to pause for a moment as muscles work themselves out and joints remember what they’re supposed to be doing. He usually feels the moon in his bones for a day or two afterward, maybe three. This is eight. “Someone’s got to go find him. Map?” He holds out his hand expectantly.

“Moony, I don’t think this is such a good--” Peter gets cut off.

“I said, map?” Now Remus is staring them both down.

James begins to stand. “Remus, I agree with Pete, I don’t think you should go after hi--”

“Listen to me, Potter.” The tall boy leans forward on the edge of the table and looks James in the eye. His consonants are sharp, his voice is deep. “It wasn’t a request.” Those are fighting words, and damn if James doesn’t know it. Hands shaking just a bit, he pulls the map out of his bookbag and passes it across the table. Remus nods curtly in thanks, wraps a pumpkin pasty in a napkin, and strides out of the Great Hall.

 

The roof. Of course. He should’ve guessed it. Only after following Sirius’s marker up to Gryffindor Tower and searching around the dorm and even common room for a solid 10 minutes does it occur to Remus that they have neglected to include a vital part of Hogwarts: the top. Sticking his head out of the window, he can see a dark figure huddled over on the roof not 10 metres away. Is that a bottle? _Oh, shit_. Sirius only gets drunk alone when things are bad. Well, Remus concedes in his head, things _are_ bad, but still.

Clambering out, the werewolf balances himself on the edge. There’s a pretty wide margin of ledge before the drop, but the view down is still enough to make his head spin. He knows there’s strong cushioning charms for a few metres out to catch him if he does fall, ever since Jayne Macalbert took a flying leap and didn’t have her broom. She had been a sixth year, and they firsties, so he didn’t know her, but it had rocked Gryffindor to its core for months afterwards.

“Hey.” Remus sits down next to the huddled-up boy.

Sirius darts suspicious grey eyes up and sideways at him before looking back down. “Hi.” His tan, normally flawless skin looks strangely blotchy, and the Remus’s gut flips. The werewolf has only seen him cry once before: not the time he skinned both knees and nearly got a concussion in a game of Quidditch, not the Christmas hols his parents hexed him half to death, but only after that... _altercation_ with Regulus last April. That had broken Sirius, and it could’ve been worse if the Marauders hadn’t been there to pick up the pieces. Now- well, now, Remus is afraid he got there too late.

There’s a long silent moment.

“How’re you?” Sirius opens his mouth like he’s about to answer, then buries his face in his knees. “I brought you a pumpkin pasty,” the blonder boy offers.

The hunched-over one tangles his fingers in long hair, twisting into it. Sirius doesn’t exactly have ‘nervous habits,’ but if he did, this would be one of them. “Not hungry.”

“But they’re your favorite.”

“Ever told you how much I loathe bribery?”

Remus can’t help but roll his eyes a little at that. He spots the bottle next to him and picks it up, surprised. “You’ve not been drinking.”

Sirius’s voice is muffled and cracking. “I was planning to, but...” He trails off, then tries to steel himself once more. “What do you want?”

“I want you back.”

“I don’t deserve you,” Sirius mumbles, and it hits Remus hard. How can he think that? It was a reckless, stupid decision, but it doesn’t change... Anything. Anything, Remus decides, it doesn’t change anything. All the feelings. All the touches. All that was said. All those scheming whispers far past curfew, all those drunken slurs of declarations, all those tender words laced with this-is-so-wrong and it’s-far-too-late-at-night and this-can’t-be-wrong-if-it’s-you. That couldn’t have all been meaningless.

Could it have?

“I forgive you, Pads.”

The dark-haired boy turns to shoot him a look. A look of what, Remus can’t tell: not sadness, not anger, not disappointment. Maybe somewhere in between. “Don’t.”

“What?”

“Don’t. Don’t forgive me. You shouldn’t. Shouldn’t be around me. Fuck, go back inside.”

Remus laughs even though he knows it’s antagonistic, raising his eyebrows at Sirius, who just turns away again. “And what am I supposed to do? Just not talk to you for the rest of my life?”

“Sounds good.”

The werewolf snorts. “That is above and beyond the _stupidest_ idea you’ve ever had.” Sirius looks up at him, this time with distinct, flashing sadness, and Remus doesn’t know what he said wrong but wishes the sentence had never left his mouth.

“That’s saying something. I have quite a few of those. As recently discussed.”

 _Oh_. **_Shit_**. “I didn’t mean it like--”

“Sure you didn’t.”

 

* * *

 

_5 days earlier._

The werewolf flings his bag on his bed and begins pulling off his shoes, which he had insisted on putting on himself despite Madam Pince’s counter-insistence that he shouldn’t strain himself. Sirius nearly falls out of his bed at the familiar noise of Moony’s weight on the creaky floor, and he pushes his way through the curtains to meet James’s cautionary expression, Peter’s worried glances, and- _oh no_.

That look.

“I know you know what I’m going to say but I’m going to say it anyway: I have never been more sorry.”

Remus’s clenched jaw and empty eyes don’t falter as the apologies spill from Sirius’s lips like liquid sorrow. The werewolf pulls the heel of his right shoe off with his left foot. The shorter boy gulps.

“I’m so, so, so sorry. I’m so sorry, Moony, I’ve never been more sorry in my entire life.” And now Remus is just standing there, silent. And waiting. “Are you okay?” No response. “I don’t know how I could ever make it up to you, and maybe I can’t, but I want you to know I’m so sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking- sending Snape down there on the moon, I- it was an awful and horrendously _stupid_ idea--”

“I’m aware.” With that, the green-eyed boy turns, climbs into his bed, and pulls the curtains shut.

* * *

 

“I know you didn’t mean it like that, you wouldn’t.” Sirius shifts around, then sighs. “See, this is what I mean. You’re too good for me. You shouldn’t have to hurt because of me.”

Remus doesn’t know how to respond to that. _I don’t hurt because of you_ , he thinks, but they would both know it’s a lie.

A few minutes later, the blond breaks the silence. “I came up here wanting to be furious at you.”

“Be furious, please.”

“It’s been over a week, I can barely stand not talking to you.”

“But I deserve it, Remus.”

“Stop saying that, it’s not true.”

“But I don’t deserve you!” Sirius nearly yells, his voice strained, echoing out into the sleepy peace of dusk. “You know it! I know it! James and Pete and Evans and Snape, even, they all bloody know it! What do you want me to do? _What_ do you want me to do??” Now his voice cracks, shouting becoming pleading. “I’m clearly too risky, I’m clearly not good enough, what do you want me to do except leave you alone?” He swings around to face Remus, nearly sending himself flying.

“Sirius, careful! Don’t fall.” Even if there are charms, the last thing he wants is a panicked McGonagall finding the two of them up here with the firewhiskey.

But instead of moving back, Sirius just smiles at him.

“Isn’t it a thrilling thought? I was thinking about it when you came out here. Just one pitch forward and,” he splays his fingers out, miming someone hitting the pavement, “ _poof_.”

“Sirius, there’s charms to catch you. Remember how Jayne Ma--”

“And what if she _wanted_ to go?” Sirius asks, voice going strangely quiet. “What if she jumped, wide awake and sober? What if she’d fucked up, Remus, what if she’d fucked up bad? Did you ever think about that? Did you ever think about how fucking _condescending_ it is? They think they can save people with a fucking cushioning charm?”

“Sirius, don’t talk like that, please don’t talk like--”

“And even if there are charms,” Sirius says louder. “Do they even matter?” He pushes himself to his feet and Remus grabs out to catch him, but it’s unwarranted. The grey-eyed boy grins at Remus as they both stand, a manic and terrified sort of grin, a face Remus has only seen when Sirius wants to shred his family to pieces, and Remus can’t figure out what he’s trying to do.

Sirius holds his wand up to his head.

“No!” The taller of the two shouts as an alarming sense of understanding floods into him and nearly knocks the wind out of him. He lunges for the wand. Sirius steps back, evading his hand. “No! You can’t do that.”

“Oh, but I can. Two words, Remus.” He chuckles coarsely. “Two words, and I’d never have to feel a single thing again.”

“Please, stop, why would you do--”

“No, you don’t understand, all I do is fuck shit up. All I do is hurt people: all I do is hurt you, all I do is hurt James, all I do is hurt Pete, all I do is hurt our House, all I do is hurt Regulus- hell," he continues, still smiling, "All I do is hurt my parents and that’s just by being me.” He shrugs, nonchalant, wand unmoving. "I'm a walking liability. Everyone would be better off if I weren't here."

"You know that's not true. Sirius, give me the wand. Come on, please." He holds his hand out, no longer reaching but begging. "Give me your wand."

"But you _know_ it is true. You _know_ I don’t think before I do things. You _know_ I almost got you killed, I almost outed you as a wolf. I almost ruined your life with a stupid _prank_ and how do you know that, next time, James’ll be there to hold me back? How do you know there won’t be a next time? How do you know I won’t hurt you like that again?”

“Sirius, you’d never do something like that again. You’d never. Give me your wand, pl--”

“Ava-"

"STOP!" Remus tries to tackle the animagus, who just dances back and laughs again as the werewolf stumbles and falls onto the pavement of the ledge.

"Am I scaring you, Remus?” Now his voice drips syrup, saccharine, enunciated, the same one Sirius uses when he’s egging on an unfortunate prank recipient. “Am I _volatile_? _Risky_? _Threatening_ , maybe?”

Remus pushes himself up. “Yes! Yes, you’re terrifying the shit out of me! You wanna know why?”

The darker boy continues, not acknowledging the question. “Kedavra.” He watches Remus flinch as he draws the word out, then lets it sit there for a moment, crisp and clean and futile. “Avada. Isn’t that beautiful? Two little words and I’d be gone.”

“You can’t!” Remus shouts. “You can’t! Can you imagine what we would be like without you?”

“Better off.” There’s no room for argument in his voice.

“I couldn’t live without you, Sirius! I couldn’t!” Remus inches towards Sirius. “I can’t! God knows James and Peter can’t, either. You’re so much more than your stupid ideas, I’d endure a thousand a day just to keep you here with me.”

Is that hesitation he sees in Sirius’s eyes? Sadness again, maybe? Whatever it is, the boy attempts to paint right over it. “You know, this is what it feels like all the time, Remus. I’m always on the ledge--”

“I’d take a transformation every night--”

“--I’ve always got the wand right here--”

“--if I can see you every morning--”

“--always got the words on my lips, I want it over.”

“Don’t do this!”

He spaces out his last four words. “I want it done.”

“Sirius, no--”

“AVADA KED--”

 

There are some things in this world we cannot control. Like sports outcomes or weather or who you get sat next to in your worst class; how she looks at him instead of you, how no one ever seems to want you quite as much as you want them, how that one bowl falls off the counter just at the worst time. All of these are things that, even with the right charm or hex, won’t work out the way we want them to without at least a moderate dose of luck. So, for most of our life spared the things that are a function of our effort (surprisingly few), we’ve just got to hope disaster sidesteps us and continues on its merry way without collision.

But sometimes, if we’re lucky, the world lets us steer for a moment.

 

“--AVRA!” The spell hits a paver all those stories below and ricochets into a tree. Remus, his eyes squeezed shut and hand clenched around Sirius’s hand, both of them gripping his wand,  winces as he hears the splintering of wood and the thud of a branch hitting the ground. No screams ensue, and he breathes a sigh of relief. No sound from Sirius.

Remus threads his arm around the waist of the boy in front of him, pulling them up against each other. Still silence, and Remus has to open his eyes to make absolutely sure the spell didn’t hit its target.

Sirius is there. Things are alright.

“I almost did it,” Sirius says at last, voice breaking.

“I know.”

“I almost fucking did it,” he repeats. “Why didn’t you let me do it?”

Remus just pulls him in tighter, and Sirius dissolves into tears.

The first rule of Being Sirius Black is that you do not let other people see you cry. You might let them see you exhausted or let them see you being a goof or let them see you furious or maniacal or running starkers through the Great Hall, but crying is off limits. Remus knows this, he knows that on top of everything Sirius must want to kill himself for crying right now, and he sits them down, still on the ledge, pulling the animagus gently into his lap. There they sit, Sirius’s head on Remus’s chest, Remus’s face in Sirius’s hair, fit together. Sirius feels as though he might not have water left in him by the time he stops crying. In response to his whimpering, Remus runs long fingers through his hair and hums a little.

“You know why I couldn’t let you?” He pauses, to steel himself not to cry. “I would tell you about how you were my first best friend.” He can’t help but smile at that, and thinks he feels Sirius smile into his shirt, too. “I would tell you about how I couldn’t let you because you’re the only reason I survived  second-year Potions and I think I owe you one.” Was that a part of a laugh? “I would tell you about how the first moon Padfoot woke up next to me, I felt like I was at home. I would tell you about how I know you, I know your beautiful parts, I know your ugly ones, and I know I need all of it. I would tell you about how I know you’re fucked up but it’s none of your fault and let’s be honest, who’s really the messed-up one here?” He leaves no time for response. “Not you. I would tell you about how you’ve only changed my life for the better, how you teach me to have a little grace, to have a little awe, to live a little more like the world means something.”

“And Pads, I would tell you about all this, how you’re such an indelible and fantastic part of my life as a Marauder, and I would also tell you about how the first time you kissed me, I saw stars.”

“Your eyes were closed. You couldn’t see me, you git.” Remus lets out a gentle laugh, and Sirius looks up at him, grinning. Now it’s a tired, easygoing sort of grin, the one Sirius wears when he’s just being a goofball- not a prankster, just a generally cheesy, pun-filled idiot- and Remus wants to kiss it. “Besides, I didn’t kiss you, you kissed me.”

“I wasn’t talking about the first kiss, I was talking about the second one. You know, the one where you weren’t just a  limp rag?”

Sirius rolls his eyes.“To be fair, I was in a state of both shock and cardiac arrest.”

“I must be a brilliant kisser.”

“Bull. I might’ve been a limp rag, but you kissed like you were kissing one.”

Remus glares, and something in Sirius’s heart hiccups. This, this is nothing like Angry Remus, this is a joking glare, and Sirius revels in it. “You bastard, I have a sentimental speech to finish if you don’t mind?”

“Right, of course. Resuming sentimental position.” He tucks his head under Remus’s chin and hugs in tighter.

“So, _anyways_ , as I was saying, I would tell you that every time I kiss you I swear I’m the luckiest guy in the world. I would tell you that you make me want to do stupid things like pick flowers and write poetry--”

“Poetry, Remus?” Sirius asks in mock horror. “My goodness, are you _queer_ or something?”

“No more than you.” Remus switches to ‘Sit-Padfoot-I-Mean-It’ Remus voice. “Sirius, shush.” Sirius obeys, and Remus can’t help but smirk, wondering just how much he could get Sirius to do with-- not the time. “You make me want to do stupid things like buy flowers and write the gayest gay poetry this gay world has ever gay-seen with its own gay eyes and make you breakfast and go on roadtrips and--”

“Roadtrips?”

“Muggle thing. It’s where you lock yourself in a car with someone you like and then drive until you don’t like them so much anymore.”

“Ah,” Sirius says in understanding. “Sounds like a Muggle thing.”

“It’s romantic, I swear,” Remus provides. “And I would tell you how I don’t want to live in a world where I don’t get to kiss you ‘good morning’ and kiss you ‘good night’ and kiss you ‘here’s your tea’ and kiss you ‘you’re so beautiful’ and kiss you ‘let’s gross the other two out’ and maybe even someday kiss you ‘I’ll be home at five’ or ‘your turn to do the dishes’, because a world where I can’t have you isn’t much of a world at all.”

Sirius begins leaking tears again, quiet now, making that humming noise in the back of his throat he does when he’s trying to calm down. It’s so terribly Padfoot it makes Remus want to laugh.

“So I would tell you all those things,” Remus continues, staying solemn. “Because they are true, and because a life without you is not worth living, but there’s a reason that beats all. It’s a reason that has nothing to do with me. I couldn’t let you do it ‘cause you’ve still got quite a few fucking bastards to prove wrong.”

Sirius laughs at that, although it’s a little dangerously brusque for Remus’s liking.

“And how am I any different from them?”

“You’re not evil, Sirius,” Remus says. “You’re not. You’re not your family.”

“And how do you know?” No answer. “How do you know?? Honest to Merlin question, how do you _know_? ‘Cause sometimes I don’t.”

“Why do you want to do it?” Remus asks instead of answering. “Is it to get away from your family?”

“I don’t know. I guess. I think it might be just that-- I don’t know how to explain it.” Sirius sits up, but he still won’t make eye contact. “I don’t want to work towards nothing. I don’t want to keep running and not go anywhere. And anything good that there could be, or is, which is few and far between, I shouldn’t get. The world is good to me sometimes and I don’t deserve it.”

“Do you think any of us could ever sleep another night without you--”

“Maybe it’s not about you. Sorry, but--” Sirius takes a deep breath, trying not to cry. “Fuck, Remus, I don’t understand, I just want to do it.”

“I think they say it’s chemicals. Depression and all that.”

“But how do chemicals fuck up this badly? How am I fucked up this badly?”

Remus doesn’t have an answer, just pulls Sirius back into a hug and kisses him on the forehead.

“Fuck, I don’t deserve you.”

“Stop saying that.”

“It’s true. I can’t do anything right, and you’re everything right.” He pauses, before reading Remus’s mind so well the werewolf decides to never give him divination help again. “And don’t you dare make that into a sex joke Remus Lupin or I swear on Merlin’s beard I _will_ punch the living daylights out of you.”

Remus laughs. “Well, I wasn’t going to say it out loud. Would ruin the moment just a tad, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, a little.”

“I don’t know if I’m any help, but if you ever feel like this again, I could talk to you, or we could take you to Madam Pomfrey--”

“No. No, they’d lock me up.” Sirius sniffs. “They did it to my great-great-uncle. He jumped off a bridge. They locked him up, they’d lock me up. Promise you won’t let them.”

“Never, never, never. Just please never do it.”

“Why do you care so much? Just let me--”

“Because I love you.”

This catches Sirius’s breath, takes the air right out of him. He has to pause. “Like a Marauders love? Love like a brother, or love like...” Dare he ask it? “Other things?”

“Love like a brother. And love like... other things, too.”

“Well, that’s a little fucked up.”

“You’re one to talk.” Remus pauses. “I mean, you’re not. You’re not fucked up. Just- let me take you on road trips and write you gay-as-fuck poetry and even if I can’t be in love with you at least let me wake up with you after the moon and please don’t do it. Don’t do it because I love you and you should, too. Please don’t.”

 

* * *

 

Now, Remus can hear both of their voices, strained and choked-up, yelling in his head like it was yesterday they were standing on the ledge, not five years past. It may as well have been five lifetimes.

_“How do you know there won’t be a next time? How do you know I won’t hurt you like that again?”_

_“Sirius, you’d never do something like that again. You’d never.”_

Damn, Remus had believed it when he said it. He had believed it like he believed that the Map would work on the first or fifth or fiftieth try (wrong, proven time and time again), like he believed that if he worked hard enough lycanthropy wouldn’t screw him over after Hogwarts (wrong, plain and simple), like he believed the moon and the stars were meant to fit together (he had thought he was right about that one, until last week).

But here he is. James and Lily and Peter are gone. There has been a next time, he realizes.

Maybe that was the one thing Sirius didn’t lie about.

Maybe he should’ve just let Sirius take care of himself.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I tried not to get too mushy with this one, although I'm not sure how successful I was in that. Title taken from [this poet's tumblr](http://littlesoldier.co.vu/tagged/my-writing). Please let me know what you think, and thanks for reading!


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